"No! Let go of me! We're not leaving her! WE'RE NOT LEAVING MY SISTER!"
— Ash after being forced to leave their sister behind, moments before she sacrifices her life
Since Wake The Dead is a Zombie Apocalypse story where Anyone Can Die and some choices you make will come back to bite you (no matter how well-intentioned they are, and also, pun not intended), things can get downright tragic.
- The first big tear jerker is in Chapter 2, when Brynn (Ash's sister) is unable to go on after being shot, and there are a horde of zombies coming. Brynn says her goodbyes to the group before sacrificing herself. Ash doesn't want her to die and has to be dragged away screaming for their own safety. Their reaction, well, see the page quote.
- In Chapter 4, Angel wants to bring her (zombie!) parents to the colony. The others hate the idea and suggest that her parents be shot. Regardless of your choice, it ends up in tears.
- If you chose to kill her parents, Angel is mortified. She cries that her parents are all she has left, the others counter that she lost them a long time ago. After Angel finally relents and tells Ash to Get It Over With, her parents are killed in front of her.
- If you chose to bring her parents with you (even with the notion of keeping them locked up in a shed a safe distance away from the colony), they escape and bite Mack, forcing Ash to put him (and Angel's parents) down. Angel truly regrets her decision.
Angel: I'm sorry. I just wanted my parents. I never wanted anyone to get hurt... - Cassidy's death in Chapter 5. Made even worse if you chose to bring Angel's parents back to the colony; Cassidy sacrificed herself to save Mack, who ends up being killed by Angel's parents just weeks later.
- Even if you killed Angel's parents earlier, Mack still sacrifices himself to save you in Chapter 19 anyway.
- In Chapter 11, Eli is bitten, much to the shock and horror of the rest of the characters. But it gets worse, the Raiders plan on storming Ash's colony to take everything from them, and when they show up, Ash bids goodbye to their friends, and accepts that the Raiders will probably kill them before confronting them. "Things fall apart", indeed.
- In Chapter 16, we discover that Brynn isn't really dead; she got turned into a zombie, and a queen, no less. Seeing Ash go into a Heroic BSoD in the following chapter really hits fans in the feels.
- Almost all the deaths in Chapter 19 are pretty heart-wrenching, with several characters sacrificing themselves for Olympus, including Darren (if you saved him in Chapter 9), Mack (if he's still alive by then) and especially Walt, who was killed in front of his daughter Minna.
- And finally, Chapter 20, when Brynn really dies. Definitely the biggest tear jerker of all. At least Ash manages to break through to her and bring her back to her senses, and she manages to kill the Zombie Queen in the end...
